Drusilla's fury now redoubled rose; With blazing eyes she rather hissed than said: "He takes Drusilla to be such as that! Will seek me under cover of the dark! Hark thee! _I_ to be visited by stealth, The happy finish of a night's carouse! Give him my compliments and tell him, Nay! Bid him by daylight come, in proper state, And bringing with him his empire cast it down A proffered bauble at Drusilla's feet-- I will consider of the matter then. Up, go, speed, tell him what I thus have said. I am in haste to wash this stain away, And fling his insult back into his face. He is mighty, he--but I am haughty, I; I am as haughty as he mighty is: I burn in hell until he knows this from me. Thou hangest--wilt not go?--art false to me? Aye, thou art false, or thou hadst out of hand Told him thou knewest Drusilla otherwise Than to dare take her such a word as that!" "The emperor should see my lady now," Said Simon with provoking flattery, Provoking, yet it mollified her mind, And shaped her to receive what he would say-- "Yea, but the emperor should behold thee thus-- If he would have his beauty spiced with spite, And splendid with a little awfulness. I have never seen thee so the queen before! But, madam, in good sooth and soberness, Behooves that we consider well our way. The emperor is a dangerous man--or god, Thou knowest they deify this personage; It were not wise to tempt him overmuch. Yet I agree thy woman instinct well Advises thee to dictate terms to him. Let these be high--agreed; but not too high: Not quite impossible, observe; enough, No more, to give thee value in his eyes. "I think of one end that thou mightst subserve By a condition prior to consent-- An end long meditated, and most dear, Not to thee only, but no less to him, Thy well-belovéd consort late. Why not Say to the emperor: 'Give thou me a pledge Beforehand of thy worthy sentiments Toward thy poor vassal, in this little thing: Put Paul to death and all the curséd crew That hold with him, exempting not a soul-- This do thou first, O emperor august, A very little thing, and see if then Thy will find let in my will; so be I Am honored as befits my quality'-- A guardian clause elastic of import, Which thou mayst after construe as thou wilt? Such terms I might obey to bear to him, And they could only heighten his regard Of thee, and more thy hold on him assure."